Fewer Than Half of Americans Oppose Gay Marriage, Poll Finds

Note: During the 2008 Amendment 2 campaign, Equality Florida partnered with the NoOn2 Campaign to invest in an outside polling service. The results of that research revealed 77% of Floridians believed same-gender couples deserved at least some legal protections, whether through domestic partnership, civil unions, or full marriage equality.

The following Pew Research poll reveals that Americans' attitudes are changing significantly in the direction of full Marriage Equality.

(CNN)—Fewer than half of Americans oppose legalized same-sex marriage, according to a new poll on the issue released Wednesday, with significant shifts in public opinion on the issue just since last year.

More Americans continue to oppose gay marriage than support it, according to the poll, which was released Wednesday by the Pew Research Center. But for the first time since Pew starting asking about same sex marriage 15 years ago, fewer than half of those polled said they oppose legalizing the institution.

The poll revealed other firsts. For the first time since Pew began asking about the issue, more white mainline Protestants and white Catholics favor gay marriage than oppose it.

“The shift in opinion on same-sex marriage has been broad-based, occurring across many demographic, political and religious groups,” Pew’s polling analysis said.

The analysis noted that political independents, who were opposed to gay marriage by a wide margin just last year, are now divided on the issue.

The poll—which combines two surveys conducted from July to September of this year—found that 42 percent of Americans favor same-sex marriage, while 48 percent oppose it.